Zais says South Carolina won’t participate in new round of Race to the Top program
State Superintendent of Education Mick Zais said today that South Carolina would not participate in a new round of the federal Race to the Top program that was announced by the U.S. Department of Education.

“The Race to the Top program expands the federal role in education by offering pieces of silver in exchange for strings attached to Washington,” Zais said. “More federal money for education will not solve our problems. Schools need less, not more, federal intrusion to increase student achievement. The previous two rounds of Race to the Top were not competitive grant programs; they were top-down directives forcing states to adopt programs favored by Washington. Respectfully, South Carolina will not apply for this money.

“I urge President Obama and Secretary Duncan to spend their time supporting efforts to reduce the role of the federal government in education by working with Congress to pass an Elementary and Secondary Education Act that decentralizes education policy. States and schools need flexibility, not more federal mandates, to meet the academic needs of students, empower parents with more choices, and reward excellent teachers for their success in the classroom.”

For ethical reasons, I cannot vote on the passage of S. 36. The original version of S. 36 that passed the Senate did not address the Amazon issue. S. 36 is a bill that gives a sales tax exemption to sales and rentals of home medical equipment (HME) subject to Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement. The logic behind this bill is that HME providers can’t collect the sales tax from the consumer or Medicare/Medicaid. Since Medicare’s competitive bidding process is in its beginning stages, this tax exemption puts SC HME providers on a level playing field with those in our neighboring states. Since I am a provider of home medical equipment and would personally benefit, I found it necessary to recuse myself from voting on S. 36 in the Senate Finance Committee and in the full Senate.

Last week, the SC House amended S. 36 to include the sales tax exemption for the Amazon distribution facility in Lexington County. Since it still contains the language benefiting HME providers, I am compelled to recuse myself again as the Senate considers S. 36.

However, I’m told by Senate attorneys that I will be able to vote on amendments addressing Amazon if they don’t affect the HME tax.

There are many unanswered questions about this deal that the Senate will address. One issue I have is Medicaid funding. Let’s say Amazon starts to sell cigarettes online. What happens to our Medicaid funding if a majority of South Carolinians start purchasing cigarettes from Amazon online? At a savings of $5.70 per carton, that is a real possibility to a chain smoker (unfortunately, we have many). Even though S. 36 currently does not require Amazon to collect and transfer sales taxes to the Department of Revenue, the consumer is still required to pay this tax when they file their income taxes. Is there some common ground for the DOR to enforce this requirement that most citizens are not aware of?

The Senate will take up S. 36 this week. I look forward to a healthy debate on this issue, and hope we can amend S. 36 to attract Amazon and maintain a level playing field in the free market.

Hand Up, Not a Hand Out

During the budget debate in the South Carolina Senate I made the illustration that South Carolina Medicaid is a “Mercedes insurance plan”. In my pharmacy I work with hundreds of health insurance plans and none offer benefits comparable to our Medicaid system. Hard working South Carolina taxpayers are forced to pay for premium coverage for others. These same hard working taxpayers could never afford these benefits themselves. Where’s the fairness in that? Welfare programs should be a “hand up” instead of a “hand out”. Government assistance should be a temporary benefit instead of a lifestyle.

I am trying to convince my Senate colleagues that our focus should be on those unable to help themselves. The priorities should include our low-income elderly needing nursing home care, yet recent cuts may lead to less nursing home beds. Social assistance should include our mentally disabled population unable to pursue their own provisions, yet these programs have been reduced. My heart goes out to single moms struggling to provide for their children. We can do better at requiring dead-beat dads to provide for their kids. It’s his responsibility, not the taxpayer.

Employers witness objectionable attitudes regularly. A concrete business owner was told “this is hard work, I’d rather stay at home and draw my check.” My office offered to assist a constituent in finding a job. The answer was “I’m not interested in a job, I want to keep drawing my check.” To the taxpayer, this familiar mindset is disgusting.

Senator Jim DeMint said it best: “We can’t just keep paying people to stay at home, we’ve got to create economic activity to allow businesses to grow so they can hire people.”

I have supported efforts to increase payments to the unemployment debt we owe the Federal Government. This debt payment will result in immediate reduction in taxes for every employer in South Carolina, increasing their ability to hire. History has proven that when you reduce taxes, you stimulate the economy. Increasing job creation ability will surely help our suffering unemployed citizens that want work. When we help folks find a job, we help them be self-supporting.

Excessive welfare benefits are not only offensive to the taxpayer footing the bill, the handouts also impede on the liberty of the beneficiary; prolonging government dependency.

In Barry Goldwater’s Conscience of a Conservative, he said: “Indeed, this is one of the great evils of Welfarism – that it transforms the individual from a dignified, industrious, self-reliant spiritual being into a dependent without his knowing it.” I also agree with Goldwater’s assertion “I do not undertake to promote welfare, for I propose to extend freedom.”

Social programs should be reformed and must go to the truly needy; not the greedy seeking an easier path to avoid a job.

Kevin Bryant represents Anderson County in the South Carolina Senate. www.kevinbryant.com